Ep. 175 || Emily & Laura's Favorite Things Transcript
This transcript has been edited for clarity.
Laura: Well, hello, hello and welcome to another episode of Risen Motherhood. This is a new one!
Emily: Yes, this is our second, full, original episode this fall season. We hope you've been enjoying our “Best Of” episodes from the archives.
Laura: Yes, totally. I feel like we needed to tell you right away so that you guys know this is not an episode from the archives. It's new! It's new! This is us in 2020 speaking to you because today, we want to tell you guys all about some of our “Best Of” products going with the theme of the “Best Of” season. Something that people often think as associated with Risen Motherhood, is the fact that we do love to share lots of resources.
Emily: We really enjoy resources. We use them in our daily life and we try to share the ones with you that we think are genuinely helpful and beautiful and all those good things.
Laura: Typically, we've actually gone through pretty much every resource that we recommend to you, or someone on our team has used it personally, which makes us pretty slow to recommend new resources. Think about a yearly Bible or something. Maybe not a Bible. The Bible is a bad example because we've read the Bible before.
Emily: Like a calendar or not a calendar. What am I trying to say? A planner. A planner...
Laura: Or a journal, [laughs] or a daily devotional.
Laura: That's what I was trying to go to. Where it's like, "Well, we actually have to read that which takes a year or 30 days or whatever." Sometimes we’re a little bit slow to release new resources, but we're really thankful to be able to present to you guys resources that have been tried and true. Today, these are the resources that have stood the test of time.
Emily: Stood for the whole five years that we've had Risen Motherhood. We wanted to pick out our top 10 list. Before we dig into this, no, this is not exhaustive. If you've subscribed to our newsletter, or you've checked our show notes, or you've seen us on social media, you know we recommend probably, over the course of the year, like 100 products or more. We're just limiting it to 10 things, which means we can’t cover every single thing we've loved. [For more] visit our recommended resources page on our website. You can find that in our show notes to find all the things, or subscribe to our newsletter if you want to get those ongoing updates because today's list is a cool one, but it's not all the things.
Laura: It's pretty small actually. The second thing we want you guys to know is just that no one paid us to be on this list. A lot of times when podcasters, or blogs, or influencers will put together a list like these they'll either be paid to be on them or maybe they'll make some sort of percentage as an advertising or sponsorship. This is not a sponsored show. This is not a show where people have paid to get advertisements with us. We’re going to include links on our show notes to all of these things, and they'll probably be affiliate links at some level.
Affiliate links, just as a reminder if you're not familiar by now, essentially, it's at no cost to you, but we’ll make a portion of the sale. It will be returned right back into Risen Motherhood if you shop through the link on our site. That money, those dollars go straight into running the ministry of Risen Motherhood. A lot of these will be affiliate links on our sites, but just as a reminder, no one paid us to talk about these. Truly, truly these are from the bottom of our hearts, products that we really genuinely like and aren't being paid to talk about.
Emily: Before we jump in, the other thing, we wanted to just mention really quick is that you don’t need any of the things on this list to have a thriving relationship with God, or to pass along the gospel to your children. I feel like this time of year especially, you're on social media, or just talking with your friends, it can start to feel like product overload. We know that every day you're getting offered thing after thing after thing then it feels like, "Oh, I need to get that. I need to get that." We don’t want to add more burdens or make you feel like you need something special or fancy in order to grow with your relationship with God.
I mean this sincerely, and I know Laura is behind me too. If you're in that spot right now, where you're already struggling with envy or covetousness towards things that you feel like you need to have, it's okay to turn this off and skip this episode.
Laura: I think that something that I was challenged by was a long time ago, Emily talked about just read the Bible to your kids. Read the actual Bible to your children, because I think a lot of times we can get caught up in getting all the illustrated retellings of the Bible, or the fancy journals, or all the fancy devotionals, and we're looking for that product that [answers], "This is my child's problem, or this is my problem, and this product will tell me exactly how to talk about it and the things that can change it, or whatever." We just want to encourage you, like Emily is saying here, is that all you need is the Bible and living life around you.
To draw connections for your children, you need nothing beyond the tools that God has given you. I'm hopeful you have a copy of the Bible, it's free online if you don't have a copy of it. I know that there are women and men that have all the fancy tools, and all the fancy “best of products” and whatever else and they don't have a thriving relationship with God. Just know that a new journal is not a silver bullet solution to feeling like maybe you're apart from God, or that you want to get to know him more. You don't need those things. All you need is your Bible and just a heart that's willing and ready to learn.
Emily: We can speak from firsthand experience because we get a lot of products sent to us. My shelves are packed full. I’ve got everything available and it’s still hard, and it’s still at the end of the day about wanting to follow the Lord and worship him with our time and energy. Just hear that upfront, but we still hope that this is a really fun episode. Just because we don't need nice journals or books or markers, et cetera doesn't mean that they’re not a blessing to enjoy, or they can't have a place or be helpful in some way because we know that great craftsmanship, and artistry, and writing, all of those gifts that different people as part of the global body of Christ have, can really help serve us in our Bible study time and our talking to our kids.
I'm really grateful that people use their gifts that way. It's really fun to be able to use those tools.
Laura: Hopefully, this gives you some good ideas for perhaps your own Christmas gift list or for gift giving for other people. We know that sometimes it can be tough to know what to buy people, so we're hopeful that this can be something that just helps you with making those lists.
Emily: I'm always going back to the scarf, the socks.
Laura: Slippers.
Emily: The slippers. Hopefully, these are some intentional ideas. Also, we hope this helps you put some intentional things on your own list. I know sometimes it can feel like Christmas comes around and people ask me, "What do you want?" and I'm just like, "U-u-u-h." I think of something that I'm going to forget about a week after it's been given to me. I’ve really appreciated a couple of these things on this list have been given to me as gifts, and it's just been a huge blessing and a gift that keeps on giving.
Laura: We do have to start though.
Emily: We're jumping into the top 10 now.
Laura: We're jumping into the top 10. Number one, I feel like it's funny to start with this one, but it's probably one of the things that Emily looks forward to most all year long.
Emily: We're going to joke about this, but I use the things on this number one over and over and over again.
Laura: 100% you do it all the time, all the time.
Laura: It's the R|M shop. We have a big shop once a year. You guys have probably heard us talk about it, and if you’ve been around Risen Motherhood for very long you probably wondered, “when on earth is it going to happen?” We only do a shop one time a year, yes, it really is for only one week, one time a year. It is a short amount of time we recognize that, but we're hopeful that during this one time you can get a little bit of R|M swag, a little bit of merch that you really like, and be able to use that year-round. One thing to note with this probably, the best part about it is that it's a massive fundraiser for Risen Motherhood.
This is something that supports the ministry. If you’ve been thinking about, "Hey, how can I support Risen Motherhood? Maybe I'm not able to be an ongoing donor, but I want to do more than pray, and I would really like to get a little something along with it." Well, this is a great way to go ahead and buy yourself a coffee mug, buy yourself a t-shirt, something like that, and to support the efforts of the ministry— spreading the gospel around the world.
Emily: What's great is a lot of our products say, Risen Motherhood on them and so you're out and about and people want to know, “where'd you get that t-shirt?” It's a conversation starter. Then you can hopefully, share about your favorite podcast.
Laura: I love it because I've heard stories about two women seeing each other in an airport both wearing R|M stuff, or maybe they see each other around town and instantly friends are made. The more we can get these shirts out in the wild, I feel like the more chances we have of y'all making friends with each other.
Emily: We've really worked hard to try to find sweatshirts that are actually comfortable and fit well and t-shirts that wear well. They fit well on your body. I do think it's nice to wear them. I wear my R|M [stuff] literally almost every day.
Laura: Literally almost every day Emily wears R|M stuff.
Emily: I do. I love it.
Laura: I know I love it too. The things for you to know: The shop is only open until the 11th. If you're listening to this after November 11th, 2020, the shop is already closed. You have to wait another year. We’re very firm on that date and every year we get lots, and lots of emails, particularly from husbands who’re feeling really bummed and are saying, "I knew I was supposed to get here. Is there any way I get a shirt?" We are not going to be able to help them. Please, tell your husbands it’s a hard end date. Also, there are some clothing items in the shop, but then there are some other things like banners, and mugs, and jewelry.
Emily: All of those items, there's only a limited quantity and once they're gone, they're gone. As soon as this shop opens, if you're interested in one of those kinds of specialty items, again not a t-shirt or sweatshirt, but a banner, a mug something like that. You probably ought to get it right away.
The other times, the clothing items are all pre-ordered, which means you can get exactly the quantity you want, exactly the size you want. We're going to make sure that all of those are available.
Laura: Speaking of when you get your stuff, so we’re really, really hopeful that everything will get there by Christmas. We're doing the shop pretty early so that we have lots of time prior to Christmas because we know a lot of you guys like to shop and buy your friend's Christmas gifts and that is so wonderful. As you guys know, COVID has really made things tough, and even planning the shop this year, it's been really, really difficult even just to get as far as we have to get the shop open now. We’re just asking ahead of time for your grace in the shipping process. We, again, are working as hard as we can.
We're working ahead of schedule as much as we're able to get those items to you as soon as we can. Again, we're really hopeful that they'll all be there by Christmas and they really should, but COVID has made things really weird and unpredictable and it's just a reality of our lives.
Emily: Definitely head to our show notes to find a link to the shop or risenmotherhood.com/shop to get all of the details to see what we have. The shop opens today, remember it closes on the 11th.
Laura: Oh, and one cool thing we also have this year that's new is we have kid tees. You can get matching mama, kiddo tees. If you're into that, it's super cute. They’re cute tees. Anyway, check those out. What's number two, Emily?
Emily: Valley of Vision. This is a collection of Puritan prayers. I finally got a copy of this for Christmas about a year ago. I have really enjoyed using this alongside my quiet time for most of the last year. They have everything in there from morning and evening prayers throughout the week, they've also got topical options for when I'm thinking about grief, or I'm thinking about my sinfulness, or I'm wanting to just have a prayer that worships the Lord. I can also look up what I'm looking for. It is in old English, so you have to be able to get your mind around that.
It's so beautiful, and often I find that these prayers help give words to what I'm thinking and feeling in a theologically rich way when I maybe have just woken up for the morning and my brain's not firing on all cylinders yet. What about you, Laura?
Laura: For old English, it’s not that hard to read, I would say. I’ve read quite a bit of old English and I feel like they're short and succinct. I would encourage you even if you're like, "Old English, no way." It's really not that difficult to read. Like Em’s saying, it gives you words. Often, I will feel like I don't even know what to pray, and this is really convicting. It'll put you in your place right away. It's not only beautiful to read, but it's also beautiful for your soul.
Emily: I want to read a little bit out of one. This one is from a prayer called “The Family” and this little section I really loved the other day, so I have my bookmark in it. It says, "Sanctify and prosper my domestic devotion, instruction, discipline, example. That my house may be a nursery for Heaven. My church, the Garden of the Lord, enriched with trees of righteousness of thy planting for thy glory." Isn't that “nursery of Heaven” line one to think about?
Laura: Seriously.
Emily: So many gems like that throughout this whole thing.
Laura: Give it a try. Maybe have some friends get it too and you guys can talk about it, and talk it through and say, "What on earth did this mean? What do I need to do?" I think it's a really good one. It has a leather-bound gift edition that is really, really pretty and probably worth the upgrade, I would say because if your copy is like ours, it will get a lot of use.
Emily: Let's move to number three, The Give Me Jesus’ Journal.
Laura: Gretchen is a dear friend of ours, she runs Well Watered Women and she created this journal quite a few years ago, a lot of years ago. Every year, she just continues to improve it and make it really beautiful and releases a new version of this journal, but this is one that we both have loved to use, especially when we're studying the Bible on our own. Perhaps we're not in a current Bible study, but instead, we're working through some passages. It just has great prompts, it's really beautifully designed, and I feel like this is the OG of Bible journals.
Emily: It is. I somehow stumbled upon this, I think not long after Gretchen started her shop.
Laura: Pre-Risen Motherhood.
Emily: Pre-Risen Motherhood, and I think I gifted one to Laura and Becca, which is so fun.
Laura: Yes, you did.
Emily: It's really great. It works the way my brain works with journaling, which is why I so appreciate it. It's got the date and then you write down your passage. There's space to write down your reflections, and then there's also space to write down your prayers. One thing that she does that's special that I really like is at the beginning of the journal, I'm assuming she still has this, I haven't combed through her latest version because it just came out, but you can actually write your prayers for the journal and there's some reflection at the beginning, so at the end, you can come back to it and see, "Wow, God actually answered a lot of those prayers as I walked through this journal."
Laura: It's very cool. Number four is the ESV Scripture Journals. This is not like the traditional ESV Bible. These are a little bit different in the sense that each book of the Bible is broken up into its own little booklet. They have one really beautifully designed one and a plain one, which I actually am a big fan of.
Emily: Yes, black.
Laura: Black, very simple, minimalist. Then they also have the illuminated version, which is feminine and beautiful and floral. The colors are swoon-worthy. I love these. These became a quick favorite, these are a newer product, and became a quick favorite in both Emily and I's life, part of it is because of traveling. When we travel, we don't want to take the whole Bible study, all that kind of stuff.
Emily: A huge study Bible with you.
Laura: Yes, this is a great one to just pack in and maybe read like a book, read through it really quickly. Another one that I have been wanting to do, I haven't done this, but I just thought I would share this on the show. I read about some friends that they will use it for their children to work through both in homeschool perhaps, or just they will read through it first, and then write a couple of question prompts in it that their child should answer after they've read the passage. Maybe they're working through the book of John or something and they're like eight or nine.
It's great reading practice, and then it's great comprehension practice, and it's great Bible practice.
Emily: Love it. I can imagine for a child it feels a lot more approachable and manageable because our oldest is just eight. I've noticed that sometimes if I hand him his whole Bible and mark things, he gets overwhelmed. There's just too many words on the page and skinny pages.
Laura: Totally.
Emily: Just handing him this one booklet, "Here's the book of John” or “here's the book of James." Going through that sounds a lot more approachable. I know another thing people have used this for at our church is for sermon notes. Our church will often go through a book of the Bible at a time. Again, going through the book of Philippians, you could just bring this to church every week and keep your sermon notes in that, and then have this really nice reference, because it comes in this really pretty box. Every time you go through a book, you can put it back in your box, and then eventually you'll have-- They have Old and New Testament, correct? The whole Bible?
Laura: Yes! They have the whole Bible.. Number five is the Val Marie Paper Yearly Prayer Journal
Emily: This is so good as well.
Laura: Another beautiful one.
Emily: What it does is, it basically keeps track of all of the things you're supposed to pray for that we forget to write down.
Laura: You're supposed to pray for, key term.
Emily: It's really clean and organized because sometimes I feel like a prayer journal can be overwhelming when there's so many places to write and spaces to write. It's broken down into 12 months of the year. There's predictable, repetitive categories. It's really clean, it's amazing.
Laura: Also, for me, I still use this pretty consistently, it's been helpful, almost for goal setting. Not that I'm always praying for me to achieve something or whatever, but it's like this idea that here's what I want to accomplish in the next year, and so there's a lot of good personal space in it. I want to pray about the Lord leading me to be faithful in my endeavors. I'm not a big long-term planner in the sense that I write it all down. I do long-term plan, but this, for me, has served a dual purpose in that.
It keeps me on track of seeing how God moved and what he had done and seeing where I want to go and seeing how the Lord redirects that. I really appreciate Val's work on this prayer journal. She's a good friend of ours too, and just wonderful. Number six is--
Emily: Daily Grace Company’s Gospel Conversation cards. This one is a little bit—maybe more—geared towards children, but it's awesome for family conversation as well. What they are, they’re these little square cards, and I believe there's more than one version.
In essence, each card has a little conversation prompt on it and just helpful aids for mom and dad to get good gospel conversation started with kids. We were really introduced to this because Daily Grace sent us some and I gave it back to my husband. He ended up keeping it in his center console, last year when they had a little bit of a longer commute to school, now they have no commute to school. When they had a longer commute to school, he would pull out one card a day and have an intentional conversation with them on the way to school. I even feel for him he felt like it was super approachable because it wasn't this complicated devotion or something like that.
They were still able to have conversation centered on the word of God.
Laura: I feel like this story or these cards became famous when you mentioned that story on a previous show. Literally, a few times a week we get people messaging in, "What were those cards that Emily's husband used?" I'm glad we're re-mentioning them. We're hopeful that's helpful. We will link them in the show notes so you guys can easily access them along with all the other stuff we're talking about today. Number seven, Dangerous Journey. Do we even know who wrote this version actually?
Emily: I don't.
Laura: Well, we will link that in the show notes. We will find out who it is and we will link it, but the point being, this is a version of Pilgrim’s Progress, and it's called Dangerous Journey. You guys have heard us talk about it a lot. Our kids are super into it, which is probably why we talk about it so much.
Emily: We had a copy of this gifted from Laura's parents early on. I think each of the kids has a little note in the front cover because this was a Jensen family tradition when they were growing up. I should be letting Laura tell this, but...-
Laura: I'm Emily's sister-in-law. Some people still don't know that. We're sister-in-laws so when she says, “Jensen family tradition,” that means mine.
Emily: I'm telling Laura's family tradition, that it would become ours. In essence, every January, your mom would read through Pilgrim's Progress to you guys. That is something that we have adopted in our family. It's a great go-to for the winter doldrums. It's something we try to read a little bit of every night by the fire. I will tell you what, this particular book has prompted so many discussions with our kids. Some of the best and deepest conversations we've had about salvation have happened after reading this book.
Laura: I can say the same. I feel like so many great questions, so many great discussions—the reason why your kids might like it is that it's illustrated on every page so there are a lot of really beautiful, well-done illustrations as well. They also can be a tiny bit scary. Emily and I feel like we always have to give that caveat, you know your child best, so make your own decision there. Some of them can lean towards scary, which our boys found fascinating. My little girl has loved it. Since she was three, it has not bothered her, but everybody has different thresholds. We recommend this just as a great family book to have on your bookshelf. There are a lot of great versions of Pilgrim's Progress. I think we would by far say this one's our favorites for kids.
Emily: This is great. Number eight is Songs for Saplings. This is a musical product.
Laura: A musical, what?
Emily: Yes, a musical product. A musical product. I do like musicals, but this is a product. It's songs that are question/answer format, basically going through common questions or catechisms for kids. One that is stuck in my brain forever is Who is God. Then there's one called Where is God and it sings this: Where is God? I used to play them when the kids were young. I used to loop them during the rest time a lot, I would play them.
Laura: Totally, they're really, really easy to memorize, great truths. Your kids will be singing them for years and years and years. They're good. They're pretty songs.
Emily: They go through the whole gospel, it talks about the creation, the fall, and all that stuff.
Laura: Number nine—
Emily: Women of the Word by Jen Wilkin.
Laura: You guys have probably heard about this book and that's for good reason. It’s a great primer on how to study the Bible on your own and understand the importance of, as Jen Wilkin likes to say, “a first-hand knowledge of our Lord.” This is a great book because it doesn't just give you the “why,” (which is really helpful,) but also really breaks down the “how.” We have an Abide method here at, Risen Motherhood, that we share for free. It's a free resource that you can download and use as you learn to study the Bible. We would say this is just a great companion to go with it.
It's very inspiring to want to dig into God's word. It's something that she just does a really, really good job of not only motivating you to say, "I want to do this." Then she breaks it down in a way that you think, "I can do this."
Emily: She really addresses a lot of the common errors and pitfalls. I can remember where I was when I read this book.
Laura: Me too.
Emily: There were so many lightbulb moments and maybe things that people had said before or I had picked up along the way but I'd never seen it packaged together and said so clearly. It's super, super helpful as an intro to just reading and studying the word of God. Alright, let's get to Number 10.
Laura: Dwell Bible App. I always really liked this Bible app, and it's an audio Bible app, essentially. You can have it read the Bible aloud to you. It's a subscription app, that's important to know. I always really liked it. I immensely saw the benefits of it one day when I was gearing up to go out that night. I was going to be around a lot of non-believers.
I was just needing some courage. I was needing truth spoken over me. They have these really great collections that they do for anxiety, or courage, or fear, or worry. Anything like an emotion that you're feeling, or maybe you want to learn about God's sovereignty or the character traits of God. They have all these collections of verses where essentially, it will just roll and read all of the passages that are related to that topic. It’ll just read them over and over and over again. I just kept hitting this one that was called Faith Over Fear and Be Strong and Courageous. I played those—I mean, I bet you I played them 10 to 20 times each.
They just met me exactly where I needed it. I remember thinking, "I don't have time to read the Bible, and I really want to be in God's word right now, but I have to do my hair and I have to get moving, and I have to do all these things." It was so great to just be able to put in my earbuds or play it on my phone and be able to listen and be encouraged in God's word, and for them to stitch that stuff together. It was worth a lot to me.
Emily: It's so good. They have different narrators that you can choose.
Laura: Different voices.
Emily: If you prefer a man's voice or a woman's voice or an accent, anything like that. You can also schedule to have it remind you at a certain time of day that you want to listen to whatever plan it is that you've selected. There's a lot of options. I could also see this as being something that's really helpful again to have in the background during rest time, or to listen to maybe in earbuds if you're having a hard time falling asleep at night. Or you're up in the night with kiddos and again, you're wanting something intentional to listen to, but your eyes are burning while you're trying to read something. There's just so many moments where...
Laura: In the car.
Emily: You could use that 5 minutes or 10 minutes or 20 minutes. They even have it so you can see how long the reading is that they're going to give to you. You can really make it work for you. It's amazing.
Laura: That is our top 10 list. We hope that somewhere in there, you were like, "That one sounds good." Now, we're going to walk through, very quickly, we're not going to tell you a lot about it, but we're going to talk about our best gift ideas for the kids on your list by age. Then we're going to also give you guys our top three to five favorite books, which is a big deal for us to give because, favorite books, asking us that is like asking, which is our favorite child. It's just really hard to pick favorite books.
Emily: I'm not going to do it.
Laura: Emily's just totally quitting the game.
[laughter]
Laura: That's fine, I'll play the game, but I do reserve the right to say that this has changed or there are others waiting in the wings. Let's just rapid-fire, Em. What are our best—because we've predetermined this in talks already, but what's the best baby toddler gift that we have?
Emily: My go-to is Baby Believer series.
Laura: You got a new mom, we recommend the Risen Motherhood book and we recommend the Baby Believer Series.
Laura: Age 3 to 6.
Emily: Tales That Tell the Truth series.
Laura: I'm going to tell you guys something that I’ve not said on anything else, anywhere. Except actually, I said it on one podcast that people may or may not have listened to. I'm going to write a book in the Tales to Tell the Truth series!
Emily: Yes, Laura wrote one on prayer. That one is hopefully coming out in 2021.
Laura: In August, or September, or October, we don't know. It's fine. I'm really excited. That is not why it's included on this list, for the record. When I was asked to write a book in the series, I was like, "Absolutely." Because I deeply respect and love this series. These books are already beloved in our home, so it would be an honor to contribute. Anyway, spoiler alert—I can't believe I haven't said it on Risen Motherhood yet, but I will at some point. Next is Ages 6 to 8. Emily, what do we like?
Emily: Bible Infographic for Kids.
Laura: This is by the team at Harvest House, the whole team.
Emily: Yes.
Laura: Ages 8 to 10, what’s our fav?
Emily: The Action Storybook Bible.
Laura: Yes.
Emily: You said you were going to share your top three to five favorite books so go.
Laura: All right, I will. My favorite three, and they are probably the three that just, they hit me at the right time. I read them when I needed them.
Emily: I think that's the key right there.
Laura: Totally.
Emily: That's why I have a hard time picking them because I think it's so much about what the Lord was teaching me at the time, more so than it was necessarily the book itself.
Laura: I think it's both.
Emily: It's both.
Laura: It's all the Lord.
Emily: It's a good book, but it's like all the things come together.
Laura: The Spirit just has to move like, among it all. My top three, the reason I picked these—I can expand this list quite deeply if I needed to, but the top three are because I can think of specific things that have stayed with me, and have continued on with me after reading them and I think back, "Oh, I learned that in this book." I want to bring it back to mind. The first is Humble Roots by Hannah Anderson. The second, Dane Ortlund, Gentle and Lowly. The third, Humility by Andrew Murray. Fourth Stepping Heavenward by Elizabeth Prentiss. The fifth Show Them Jesus, Jack Klumpenhower.
I'm not giving you a synopsis for what they're all about. I'm really sorry, but I would just say, go read any book on that list and you will be edified.
Emily: It's so good. I'm not picking a favorite child. I thought, "Oh, I'll write down a few authors who I've had definitely read more than one book by this author that I've really enjoyed and been edified by.” So C.S. Lewis...
Laura: Yes, of course.
Emily: I want to include, what was that book we both read? A Severe Mercy, not written by C.S. Lewis, but similar.
Laura: Gosh, who wrote that?
Emily: Kevin DeYoung. I've liked several books by him. Jared Wilson, Elyse Fitzpatrick. The other couple of specific books that came to mind, that you didn't list because we have a lot of overlap, would be The Little Book for the Christian Life by John Calvin. We were just talking about The Insanity of God before we started the show. We were talking about something totally different. I was like, "Oh, yes, that book was so good."
Laura: A Severe Mercy is by Sheldon Vanauken.
Emily: I loved that book.
Laura: I can't ever say anybody's last names.
Emily: It's hard to make me cry, like for a book to make me cry and I think I cried at the end of that book.
Laura: It's definitely a deeply touching and moving book. I will say I don't know if I agree with everything in it.
Emily: Absolutely agree with what you're saying that you don't agree with everything in it, but it was thought-provoking.
Laura: Yes, absolutely. As we give our recommendations, especially on books, we hope that you guys always know this, but we don't endorse every single little thing of every single book, just because we share something on the show. Obviously, that would be really hard. We've talked about this before, the only thing that we do fully endorse is the Bible. That's the only inerrant piece of literature on the planet. Anyway, that's the only one we'll stand behind, but just in good faith check out those books. We're hopeful that they'll really be helpful to you. I think that's the whole list. We just ripped through at the end there.
Emily: Yes, that's the list. This was our “Best of Products” episode as part of the “Best of Season.” We hope there's something helpful on there for you guys and enjoy the rest of the season.
Laura: Head over to the R|M shop, risenmotherhood.com/shop. Check that out and go to our show notes and you can find the links to all the stuff. We'll also have some gift guides coming out. There'll be things in our newsletter, if you have not signed up for our newsletter you can even go to risenmotherhood.com/newsletter and sign up for that, so that you get all of the insider information on what we have for resources and some of our favorite things and things like that. Anyway, thanks for joining us guys and happy shopping.